Potential of red palm olein as an ingredient in designing functional food: effects on maintaining body weight and lipid profile of Wistar rats

Red palm oil olein fraction (RPOn) is a derivative of palm oil products. RPOn has a good nutritional value such as carotene and tocopherol, which act like vitamins and antioxidants. The RPOn intervention shows antiatherogenic, antihypertensive, anticancer, and antidiabetic activity. This study aimed to determine the effect of red palm oil olein fraction (RPOn) intervention in standard and atherogenic (ad libitum) diets on the plasma lipid profile using Wistar rats as a model. The two types of diet conducted in this experiment comprised of a standard diet (by using Comfeed Finisher BR2) and atherogenic diet (prepared from two boiled duck egg yolks, 70 mL of pork oil, 1 g of cholic acid, and 300 g of complete cow feed). Wistar rats feeding on the two diet types were treated orally with and without RPOn (0.18 mL per 100 g of body weight) using a gastric probe. The treatments were replicated five times for each feeding type for five weeks. The rats’ body weight was measured, and blood samples were collected at baseline (0 weeks) and after 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 weeks. An ANOVA was conducted to analyze differences in body weight, total cholesterol, triglycerides, low-density lipoprotein (LDL), and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) in rats treated with and without RPOn. The findings demonstrate the ability of RPOn to maintain body weight and lipid profile, indicating its potential as a functional food due to its richness in β-carotene and α-tocopherol. No significant differences (p > 0.05) were observed in body weight and total cholesterol between rats fed diets with and without RPOn after the fourth and fifth weeks of the experiment, respectively. A similar trend was observed for HDL, LDL, and triglyceride levels.